


As We Dream

by dollylux



Series: Fic Advent Calendar 2015: Siblings, Husbands, Lovely Ladies, and Other Miscreants [1]
Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Neighbors, Flirting, M/M, Power Outage, Shy Jensen Ackles, Snow
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-01
Updated: 2015-12-01
Packaged: 2018-05-04 09:13:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,831
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5328707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dollylux/pseuds/dollylux
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>While Jensen's home from college for winter break, he runs into someone he barely recognizes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	As We Dream

**Author's Note:**

> day one | prompt: winter wonderland

“Pleeeeease?”

“Nah.”

“Jensen.” Mac sounds so sad, so put out, that Jensen actually looks up from his computer screen. She looks as pouty as she sounds, her bottom lip stuck out and her shoulders dropped. She’s all bundled up and ready to go, her scarf so thick it’s wound up above her chin, nearly hiding her mouth. “Please?”

“We’re not kids anymore, Mac,” he mumbles as he closes his laptop and hefts himself up from the warm, cozy couch. 

She hops in place a few times, clapping her hands together in a sound that is mostly muffled by her bright red gloves.

“It’ll be fun! It’s snowing and you’re home and I’ve missed you so so much!” She scurries over and wraps her arms around Jensen’s waist, melting his heart in the process. His expression softens, a smile pulling at his mouth as he wraps his arms around his little sister and squeezes her.

She’s thirteen and has miraculously held on to some of her youthful exuberance, isn’t yet too old to want to build a snowman with her brother freshly home from college on winter break.

“Lemme go get dressed. I’ll meet you out there.”

 

It’s a world of glistening white and bare trees when he finally steps outside, all snug in his winter coat and protected from the bitter cold of the wind whipping by. The snow is still steadily falling as he shuffles carefully off the porch and into the front yard, and Mac has already gotten started.

“Isn’t that Dad’s scarf?” Jensen squints through the brightness of the snow at his sister, wishing he’d thought to put on his contacts because his glasses have fogged up after venturing out of the warm house. His sister has a second scarf tossed over her shoulder, presumably for their future snowman.

“Yeah. He won’t notice,” is Mac’s reply. She’s crouched down to start the base of the snowman, holding Mom’s garden shovel and scooping snow into a big ball. Jensen drops down to help her, using his hands to add to her pile until pretty soon they’ve got a good, sturdy ball as the base of their snowman.

They’d moved up to Ann Arbor, Michigan Jensen’s senior year of high school, a world away from the dry heat of Texas where he’d grown up. Winter, which had never been that different than any other time of year in Dallas, was now a Thing. It’s still a novelty to both of them, and they’re outside enjoying the snow unlike all of their neighbors who are intelligently bundled up in their warm houses.

The snowman gets taller and taller as they pile snow on, the two of them working quietly until they get to the top. He’s nearly as tall as Jensen, and he looks pretty damn jaunty in Dad’s red scarf when Mac wraps it around his neck.

“Gonna go grab a carrot,” she tells him, turning to dash back toward the house.

“Raid Mom’s craft corner for some buttons!” he calls after her. He pokes around the yard and finds some good-sized sticks for his arms that he pushes into the middle ball of snow. Mac returns with a handful of black buttons, a carrot, and a couple of pieces of black licorice from Dad’s candy stash next to his recliner.

“You’re gonna get in trouble for touching that,” Jensen laughs, taking the candy and fashioning it into a smirk on the snowman’s face. Mac pushes the buttons into place for his eyes and the front of his chest, adding the carrot last, making sure it’s perfectly centered on his face.

They step back, looking like twins with their green eyes and their hands on their hips. Jensen grins.

“He’s awesome.”

“I’m going to name him… Harry,” Mac says with a wistful sigh, stepping closer and resting her hand on his snowy chest. Jensen raises an eyebrow.

“Why Harry?”

“Like Harry Styles,” she replies with a roll of her eyes, like Jensen’s an absolute idiot for even asking. He snorts, ignoring her glare, taking a step closer and folding his arms over his chest.

“Doesn’t that kid wear, like. Hawaiian print suits and shit like that? This guy’s much more elegant than that.” He reaches up to mess with the snowman’s scarf, tugging it to lay a little bit straighter, smoothing out the thick wool knit along the side of his rounded shoulder. “His name should be Tom.” 

Mac looks over at him, and it’s her turn to raise her eyebrows.

“Tom?”

“Hardy.” Jensen licks his lips, staring up at the silly, snowy face in front of him but picturing a whole other, very sexy one.

“Pfft. He’s not _elegant_ ,” Mac scoffs.

“But he’s sexy as hell,” Jensen offers, glancing over at her with a wink. Her face falls into something decidedly wistful and she walks up to the snowman and wraps her arms around his neck.

“That’s true,” she sighs. “Helloooo, Tom. Come here often?”

“Hey, get off my man!” Jensen laughs, reaching out to tickle her and stepping back before she can slap him. 

“You might wanna be careful,” comes a voice from nearby. “He seems a little cold-hearted.”

Mac steps back from the snowman, her cheeks flushed from the cold and probably a little from embarrassment. They both turn around and stare at the boy there on the sidewalk, the tall one with the long hair and dimples and pink-tipped nose. He has his hands stuffed in the pockets of his peacoat, and his eyes are on Jensen.

“Hey, Jared!” Mac calls out, at ease now that she apparently recognizes the boy. 

“Hey, Mac. Hey, Jensen.” The boy--Jared, steps off the sidewalk and crosses the yard to where they’ve built Tom, his grin massive and fixed on Jensen. Jensen watches him, staring stupidly as his mind races to identify this guy. Surely to God he couldn’t forget somebody with a smile like that.

Jared’s smile falls into something smaller, more amused, and he raises an eyebrow at the way Jensen is apparently looking at him.

“You don’t remember me, do you?”

“No, I do! I, uh.” Jensen squints at him through his glasses, making sure not to look over at Mac who has her hands on her hips and is most definitely rolling her eyes again.

“Duh, Jensen. You know Jared. He’s from San Antonio? He lives across the street? He hit Mr. Cline’s mailbox last summer?”

“Hey!” Jared says defensively, his shoulders hunching up though that gorgeous smile is back. “I was avoiding a squirrel!”

 _”Oh,”_ Jensen breathes, his eyes widening as it all comes flooding back. Jared Padalecki, that scrawny little kid who likes to play basketball at the goal above his garage, who lives in a faded red hoodie almost all year round and who listens to moody rock music on his headphones while he writes in a notebook on the front porch. Jared, who used to be long-limbed but scrawny, who had a few pimples and wasn’t good at making eye contact and only seemed to have one friend, some squinty-eyed kid named Chad.

“Jesus,” Jensen finally says, giving him a helplessly appreciative once-over. “You sure grew up.”

Jared laughs, a bright bark of a sound punctuated by deep, adorable dimples. He shrugs boyishly, having the humility to dismiss the compliment in the face of Jensen’s near-drooling.

“It happens,” is Jared’s reply. He stands a few inches taller than Jensen, making him feel short and little and delicate, like if he happened to fall, Jared could catch him in an effortless, heroic sweep. He’s looking at Jensen through his lashes now, his bottom lip caught between his teeth as they shuffle a little closer, their boots crunching in the snow.

Mac is watching them like a tennis match, and she finally sighs, folding her arms over her chest and shifting her weight to one hip. 

“Jared, do you like our snowman?”

Jared looks away finally, breaking the spell of quiet between him and Jensen. He turns his attention to Mac and the snowman, and Jensen blinks like he’s been released from a trance.

“He’s pretty cool. I dunno, the way y’all were looking at him… makes me kinda jealous. Is it the scarf? Is that it? I can get a scarf.” He stands up straight and preens a little, fluffing his already ridiculous hair and pulling a serious, modelesque face that makes his cheekbones look amazing.

“You dork,” Mac laughs, reaching over to shove Jared on the arm. Her cheeks are flushed, and Jensen has the sudden realization that he and his kid sister have the hots for the same guy, something that hasn’t happened since Chris Hemsworth.

Jared laughs again, such a happy, self-deprecating sound, reaching up to scruff at the back of his head, fluffing his thick hair up as he takes a step back.

“Alright, well. I’ve got some shovelin’ to do. I promised Mama it’d be done by the time she got home from work.” His hands are in his pockets again, and his smile is small and full of dimples and aimed right at Jensen. “Good to see you again.”

“Yeah,” Jensen manages, his voice scratchy. He clears his throat and ignores the heat on his face. “See you later, man.”

He and Mac are quiet as they watch Jared cross the street back to his own house, and Jensen only looks away when he feels a slap on his arm.

“Hey!” he whines, turning to glare at his sister. “What the hell?”

“He was flirting with you!”

Jensen scoffs but his heart picks up speed, something he forces himself to ignore as he gathers up Mom’s gardening tools and starts toward the house again.

“Yeah, right. He was just being nice. That doesn’t mean--”

“See you later, man,” she says in a faux dude-bro voice, impersonating Jensen like he’s a frat guy as she hurries along behind him. “What the heck was that?!”

“Me being shit at flirting,” he mumbles to himself as he steps into the warm house and bends down to unlace his boots. There’s a reason he hasn’t had a boyfriend since he left home and he hasn’t been on any second dates since he started at Penn State. 

“I’m gonna fix you up,” Mac says decidedly as she unwinds her scarf from around her neck. Jensen turns to stare at her, immediately fearful of the determined look on her face.

“Mac--”

“Don’t try to stop me, Jensen!” she yells as she runs up the stairs, leaving a trail of melting snow in her wake. “You’ll just embarrass yourself!”

He groans as he kicks his boots off and pads into the living room to add some more wood to the fire. She’s a teenager. They’re fickle, right? She’ll forget this whole mission in a couple of hours.

 

The power goes out just after seven, after it’s good and dark and the temperature is hovering just around freezing, not cold enough to stop snowing.

“Power’s out all over the city, Janice said,” Donna announces with a sigh as she hangs up the phone. “It’ll be hours to get it back on.”

“If we’re lucky,” Alan grumbles, poking at the fire and frowning into the flames. “We’re lucky we’ve got this fireplace. If we didn’t--”

“Oh, the Padaleckis!” Donna interrupts, jumping up from the couch with her phone clutched to her chest. “They don’t have a fireplace! Oh, Alan, we have to invite them over. They’re liable to freeze over there.”

“Donna, I just finished carrying all that firewood in,” Alan complains even as he stands up and shuffles over to the foyer where their boots are piled up.

“I’ll go,” Jensen offers, tucking his phone into his pocket and hurrying over to pull on his own boots. “It’s fine, Dad. Stay in here.”

“Yeah, I bet you will,” Mac says knowingly. Jensen rolls his eyes; he can hear her smirk from across the room. He turns to level her with a stare.

“Don’t you have to paint your nails or something?”

She sticks her tongue out at him, and he’s not above admitting that he sticks his out at her right back. 

The silence is absolute as he makes his way off the porch and down the walk to the street. The lights down the whole street are off, only the light from the moon showing Jensen the way across the road and up to Jared’s house. He hesitates a few seconds to gather some spare courage before he knocks, taking a step back and listening to the rustling on the other side before the door opens.

“Jensen?” Jared is bundled up in the house, his cheeks flushed with cold. It makes Jensen’s breath catch.

“Hey, Jared. Look, my mom wants y’all to come over and stay until the power comes back on, okay? We’ve got the fireplace, and Mom already made dinner.”

He watches Jared debate with himself, his inherent politeness wanting to override any need not to freeze to death a week before Christmas. Sherri appears behind him, peering over her tall son’s shoulder. She grins when she sees that it’s Jensen.

“Jensen Ackles! You look like even more of a dreamboat than you did this summer! Have you ever seen a cuter knight in shining armor?” she says to Jared as she throws a wink to Jensen. “That sounds amazing. Let us get a few things together and--”

“Anything I can do to help?” Jensen steps into the candlelit house when they step back from the doorway. It’s nearly as cold inside as it is outside, and an urgency sweeps over him to get Jared out of this freezing house and get him warmed up immediately. “Just grab some pajamas and your toothbrushes. We’ve got everything else.”

“Do you think…” Jared starts, his hands pushed into his back pockets as he stammers over his words. Jensen raises his eyebrows, wordlessly asking him to continue. “Well, it’s… it’s just. My dog.”

Jensen smiles, lifting a shoulder to shrug. “Your dog can come. Of course he can.”

 

Somehow Jensen had forgotten that Jared’s “dog” looks more like a small horse, and his bag of dog food looks like it weighs a ton as Jared lugs it across the street over to the Ackles'. Donna’s face when Harley lopes through the door, his massive tail wagging as he drips snow all over the foyer, is priceless.

Sherri joins Donna at the kitchen table while they open a bottle of wine and dig into the apple pie Jensen and Mac made yesterday, and Mac and Megan lurk in the corner of the livingroom, both of them crowded around a cell phone that lights up their serious faces.

Jensen sits on the couch, making sure not to take up too much room so Jared won’t feel crowded as he joins him. Harley pads around for awhile, sniffing everything out, but he ends his adventure by curling up at Jared’s feet and falling right to sleep.

“Are you warm enough?” Jensen turns to face Jared on the couch, pleased to see that he seems more or less thawed out, but he still has his hands tucked in the sleeves of his hoodie, and he has managed to tuck himself into the corner of the couch as small as possible. He looks over at Jensen with a tired smile.

“I’ll be fine in a few minutes. The fire is good’n warm. Thanks for doin’ this. Harley is a walking furnace, but I still think we would’ve frozen if we’d stayed home.”

“Sorry we didn’t think of it sooner. Finding all the lamps and candles in the house took almost a whole hour. I hope you didn’t get too cold.” He reaches out and rests a hand on Jared’s socked foot, giving it a little squeeze that makes Jared’s dimples flash, adorable, shadowed divets on either side of his sweet smile.

“Naw. I’m a big boy. I know how to hide under all the covers and wait for help.”

Megan and Mac stand up and wander over then, hovering behind Jared and grinning at Jensen in the most annoying, knowing little sister way ever. Jensen focuses on Mac and scowls at her.

“You can totally stop looking at me,” Jensen tells her, sitting back with his arms crossed defensively over his chest. “Any time.”

“I think Jared’s gonna have to bunk with you. Sherri can take the spare room. That only makes sense, right, Jen?” Mac is grinning now, and Megan has a hand over her mouth to hide her smile.

Jensen feels heat flood his cheeks, but he forces his face to remain neutral.

“Uh. Sure, I guess. I mean, if that’s--”

“Oh, I can sleep on the couch,” Jared cuts in quickly, looking even more flustered than Jensen feels. “No need to do all that. I don’t wanna put you out, Jensen.”

“No! No, you…” He looks back at Jared with wide eyes, barely restraining himself from reaching out to touch him again. “You wouldn’t be. My bed is plenty big. I… I don’t mind.”

A little smile lifts one side of Jared’s mouth, some of the tension leaving his curled shoulders.

“You sure?”

“As long as you don’t mind that I hog the covers a little bit.” He forgets their sisters are even watching and just focuses on Jared, holding his gaze and matching his smile with a shy one of his own.

“I don’t mind,” Jared says quietly.

“I think I’m going to turn in. I’ll make sure to put some extra pillows on your bed, Jensen.” Alan announces as he stands up from his recliner. He kisses the girls on the head, giving a nod to Jared and Jensen before heading for the stairs.

“We’re gonna go upstairs, too,” Mac tells them, grabbing Megan’s hand and pulling her toward the stairs. “Don’t forget that it’s super quiet in the house without the electricity.”

Jensen’s mouth drops open.

“Mackenzie, Jesus Christ!”

“Language, Jensen Ross!” Donna calls from the kitchen. Jensen lowers his eyes and covers his face with his hand, trying his hardest to will away how pink his whole fucking face is right now.

“Niiight!” Mac and Megan chirp together before running up the stairs, only able to hold in their giggles until they get to the top. Jensen looks up at Jared finally, letting out a sigh as he scrubs his hand through his hair.

“Sorry ‘bout that,” he mumbles.

“I don’t mind.” Jared is grinning, stretching out on the couch a little so that his knee is touching Jensen’s shin. “Promise.”

Jensen realizes that they’re alone now.

“So,” he starts, shifting on the couch, fidgeting with his own sleeves and tucking his feet under his folded legs, “you’re in your senior year, right?”

“Yeah, graduating next semester. I can’t wait. Your mom’s said so many great things about Penn State to my mom that I’m almost convinced to apply there.” 

Jensen’s eyes widen at the thought of seeing Jared Padalecki at school every day, of having a familiar face around, of seeing that dimpled smile whenever he wants to. 

“That would be awesome,” he all but bursts, too late to rein in his enthusiasm. “I mean… it’s a great school. And hey, I could show you around town.” His grin is helplessly flirtatious, and he leans forward at Jared’s soft laugh, at the way he’s looking up at him through his lashes again.

“Didn’t want you to think I was just following you around,” Jared says, searching Jensen’s eyes with so much intensity that Jensen can barely sit still. “I did enough of that in high school.”

Jensen blinks at him.

“...You did?”

“Yeah,” Jared laughs, lowering his eyes in what looks like shyness. “God, you didn’t notice? I was so pathetic. I had such a crush on you.”

Jensen just stares at him, probably looking as dumb as he feels.

“You… you had a crush on me? Really?”

Jared raises his eyebrows, leaning forward to speak quietly, like he’s just as aware of their mothers in the next room as Jensen is.

“Do you not own a mirror? You’re fucking gorgeous, Jensen.”

“Oh, god,” Jensen mumbles, lowering his gaze and settling back against the cushions. “You don’t have to flatter me, Jared. I know you’re grateful and all that you’re sleeping over, but you just have to help me carry some firewood in tomorrow or something. You don’t have to--”

He’s interrupted by a soft, warm mouth pressing against his own, by the lovely long heat of Jared’s body so close to his own, to Jared’s breath rushing quietly over his face. He closes his eyes and lets Jared make him melt, his lips parting as he kisses back. He reaches up to fist the front of Jared’s hoodie, keeping him close as he tilts his head and lets his tongue slide out to tease at the seam of Jared’s mouth.

“You’re beautiful,” Jared whispers against his lips, sounding as breathless and taken as Jensen feels. “And I’ve always wanted to do that.”

Jensen is visited by a sudden memory, of the day they moved into this house from Dallas. Jensen had been seventeen and absolutely hateful of everything that wasn’t Texas, furious that he was ripped away from everything he knew the last year of high school.

He’d been helping unload the moving van, sweat dripping down his face on the warm August day, and a lanky boy had been watching the whole time, sitting on the front steps of the house across the street. He watched for a good hour, petting the giant dog snoring at his feet, and he’d seemed to gather some kind of determination because he stood up and shuffled across the street, all long limbs and a face mostly hidden by falls of long, brown hair.

“Can I help?” he’d asked quietly, not even meeting Jensen’s eyes as he’d stuffed his hands restlessly into his back pockets.

“Sure,” Jensen had said with a careless shrug and handed him a box of comic books. The boy had finally looked up then, those vibrant, all-colored eyes meeting his own like Jensen had just handed him the keys to a kingdom. 

The dimples. He still had those dimples, even now that he’s a foot taller and twenty pounds thicker with muscle, even as he licks into Jensen’s mouth like he knows just what to do with it, even as he cups the side of Jensen’s face, practically dwarfing him with the size of it. He grins into the kiss, and Jensen can taste that dimple-making smile now.

And even here, with the world freezing outside and the snow piling up and while winter seems unending, Jensen can recall the heat of summer, can taste it in Jared’s mouth.

“Keep me warm,” he breathes into Jared’s mouth only seconds before it’s taken again in another kiss. He hopes the power never comes back on.

He’s thinking about keeping Jared.


End file.
